LG Wing is definitely one of the coolest smartphones out this year. The LG Wing teardown shows the hinge behind this unique rotating dual-display design.
LG has never shied away from radical ideas and designs and the LG Wing is no exception. The phone has barely been with reviewers for a couple of days now and reviews are going to start trickling in soon. However, today we get to take a sneak peek inside this cool gadget as Zack Nelson does an LG Wing teardown on his YouTube channel – JerryRigEverything.
Teardown reveals, hinge, riveted plates, hydraulic damper, flexible ribbon cable, and more…
LG has a cool video on its website showing an animation of the hinge. That video reminded me of the really cool hinge Microsoft debuted on the original Surface Book back in 2015. But I digress. It’s exciting to see the actual innards of this device on Zack’s video. The engineering that has gone into creating the hinge to ensure smooth rotation is simply put; phenomenal.
The engineers have taken the flexible ribbon cable through a circular hole in a corner of the PCB (aka printed circuit board) to connect the rotating display panel. LG claims that this hinge mechanism can easily withstand 200,00 cycles so it will be a while before users encounter issues even if you open and close the phone more than 100 times a day!
It’s easy for mechanical hinges to hit this cycle count but to have a flexible ribbon cable do the same is amazing. There is a double lock, dual springs, hydraulic damper, all on a two riveted plates which pivot around that hole through which the flexible ribbon cable is passed through. All of this engineering is so that each time you rotate the screen and close it back that action is smooth, stable and requires uniform force.
LG Wing teardown: Moving parts means no IP rating
There are downsides to all of this great mechanical wizardry. If you are looking for water resistance or an IP rating of any kind, you will not find it here because there are quite a few moving parts. Although to help with an occasional splash or rain shower LG has coated the internals with a water-repellant coating which is a bonus. On the plus side, this should be a great device for watching videos, playing games, and taking videos with its gimbal motion.
You can check out the AH hands-on by our own Alexander Maxham and be sure to check back for the full review.